China Wants a BRICS AI Zone. UAE Free Zones Could Be the Base

FTZ News: China Chamber of Commerce says the Emirates’ free zones are the Middle East base for a China-led BRICS plan on artificial intelligence. The note on the chamber’s site names no zone, no contract and no dirham figure. It tracks a Sept. 13 story by Justin Harper in Arabian Business. Most of what is there is still a summit proposal.

According to that story, President Xi Jinping raised the plan at the BRICS meeting in New Delhi. He called for an open-source zone for artificial intelligence, run by China. He listed large language models, training and a looser technology deal among members. He also asked for a partnership of members’ special economic zones. China, he said, would hold a BRICS service-trade forum next year. He told members to protect industrial and supply chains and to pull their markets closer. The enlarged group, he said, should be more than a diplomatic forum. It should work as a practical platform for economic development across the Global South. Prime Minister Narendra Modi said technology built inside BRICS should be offered to other developing economies too.

The group now includes Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, plus the UAE, Egypt, Ethiopia, Indonesia and Iran, and a longer list of partner countries. The UAE is the only full member from the Gulf Cooperation Council. Arabian Business said the country’s financial centers, logistics hubs and technology districts could give Chinese firms a base for customers and partners in the Middle East. UAE companies, the story said, could end up closer to markets in Asia, Africa and Latin America.

Beijing has not said who would run the zone, which technology would be shared, or whether firms would get money or a break on the rules. The chamber’s word “anchor” is ahead of the paperwork./.